As the rains fell and the rivers swelled, then swallowed up homes and spread muck and ruin across the Tristate, the Cincinnati Enquirer staff was mobilized.

It is almost as difficult now to identify everyone connected with the Enquirer's flood coverage as it is to know exactly how much water flowed under the Suspension Bridge.

We do know that, through Friday, the Enquirer published 81 pages devoted to the flood.

Staffers worked more than 1,200 hours beyond their normal shifts. Photographers shot more than 16,200 pictures. Reporters and photographers traveled more than 15,000 miles by car and spent 15 hours in the air. They also covered the story by kayak, Humvee, canoe, boat, hovercraft, firetruck and on foot.

Enquirer.com, our Internet on-line service, had more than 1.6 million ''hits'' in the peak five days of the flood.

The list below accounts for 148 people (two-thirds of the news staff) who were directly involved in our flood coverage. But in truth, everyone is involved in an effort of this magnitude.

There would be no Enquirer if all the other important tasks that make up a day's newspaper were not also done.

The primary author of this section is Metro columnist Cliff Radel, a lifelong westsider. For 48 years he has known the Ohio River as the region's most spectacular natural wonder, and its most savage adversary.

Cliff remembers trudging down to his grandfather's basement on Boudinot Avenue to look at scrapbook photos of the Great Flood of '37.

His description of the Great Flood of '97 provides an eloquent account that will be saved and pored over for years to come.

More than 100,000 copies of this section will be distributed to classrooms in Greater Cincinnati through the Enquirer's Newspaper in Education program.

The Flood of '97 will be remembered as a tragic time but also as a time when Tristaters pulled together in a common spirit of hope and renewal.